California Dreaming
I stare into an evening sun; a pebble-sized hole in the reddening horizon.
August 12, 2013
Shame
The house’s front door bangs shut, clipping out the evening sun. I listen from a narrow half-hall on the second story. I recline at the foot of my parents’ bedroom door—an idiosyncratic delicacy much missed this past month—rocking my knees together and flexing my jaw, attempting to relieve air pressure the thirteen hour plane ride stuffed in my ears. I hear socks sweep over carpet from the room. The door squeaks open, releasing a cloud of bitter cologne that settles in my mouth; I wipe my tongue on my T-shirt to get the taste out. “Thanks for that Mom,” I say.
August 4, 2013
Two Lovers in a Field
The afternoon sun has the cowboy squinting his eyes. A woman stands next to him, twisting her hips and smiling into his leather face. Both recline against a gray wooden cow fence. A warm breath lifts from the heat-soaked dirt and grass. The cowboy breathes in the prairie. His scent is rude and distinct; hard-labor and brine; a spicy, musky cologne from his button-down; he scowls. It disfigures the woman’s subtle bouquet—her’s is too delicate. He sniffs it up and lets it play on his tongue. He repeatedly taps his heel against a fence post, trying to guess what happens next. He had never made such fuss over a woman, even a fine one like Estrella. Why start now?
July 27, 2013
World's Heaviest Chili Dog
The diner was a long, yellow train car, permanently set into a cement slab, with a little caboose at the back where the cooks worked and white smoke rose from a tin-hatted vent on its roof, perfumed with grease, salty warm breads, and rich sauces. The middle-aged mother and teenage son tilted their heads to read the crooked railroad sign out front that read, ‘Velma’s — Home of the world’s heaviest chili dog!’
July 18, 2013
He has bigger issues than what to write.
I need to write something . . . I don’t have anything to say. I’ll ask a couple of questions, but I may have reached the limit today; there’s nothing but dim dusty-space stirring in my mind. Oh here’s something, coming along, but it’s just a dream that I said goodbye to already, before I knew what was bad. I’m talking to myself because I need to write, I need to get words on the computer, but I’m scared.
July 13, 2013
The Boy Who Found a Feather
Years ago, before PlayStations and Xboxes, iPhones, Android’s, tablets and streaming TV, when a young boy would play with no more than warm stones or thrown-out processed food cans, this young boy, our young boy, the young American of our story here, found a feather.
July 9, 2013
Let Them Eat Deer
It’s been three days running in the hot sun. My supplies were set for a five-day journey, but I passed the fifth day a fortnight ago . . . I can’t fail my people.
July 6, 2013
Scylla on the Sea Cliff
The horizon slowly dips; spilling the sun’s rich purples and orangish-reds over the turbulent waves; warming the morning sea. The girl stands on the edge of a cliff from which a low-hanging bridge spans eighty feet of open water to a small island of jagged rocks. A brown tendril of hair flaps against her cheeks. Her taut skin peels and shines in the mist. She bends with spread legs under the weight of her pack: an enormous military backpack which overflows with reels of fishing line, pre-baited with a variety of pastes and small fish, and three segments of fishing pole that stick up from the top at three different angles. She squeezes the pack’s straps across her chest and belly. The black plastic tunic grumbles as she wipes the sweat from her lip. “Come on Scylla,” she says, “you have to do this for father. For the village.”
June 30, 2013
Ulrik and The Mountain Woman
The gray stone steps jutted in odd angles, irregularly shaped and sized, and without clear separation from the mountain’s natural features. Were they built in, or carved out? thought Ulrik. It’s just the same to my legs, he supposed. The smell of rotting wood and sod-berries in the humid forest air made his lungs feel heavy and he thought he might rest and share water with his small companion: a Yorkshire Terrier who panted wildly, but nevertheless remained no more than three inches from the boy’s heel.
June 22, 2013